Maurice Newman, the prime minister’s business adviser, has called for a government-funded review of the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) to “dispel suspicions of a warming bias” in its temperature record-keeping.

Newman, who has repeatedly questioned the findings of mainstream climate science, wrote in an opinion piece for the Australian that the bureau needed to be investigated over allegations of “temperature manipulation.”

The Australian has run a series of articles questioning data “homogenisation” techniques used by the bureau when collating temperature records. The bureau measures temperatures at nearly 800 sites across Australia.

The newspaper has published the views of Jennifer Marohasy, a climate science sceptic, who has claimed the BoM has “corrupted the official temperature records” by adjusting data and moving the location of temperature monitors to make it appear that Australia is warming.